‘Sick monster’: Golden State Killer jailed for life over serial rapes and murders

The former police officer known as the Golden State Killer, who terrorised California for over a decade, has been sentenced to life in prison.

Joseph DeAngelo, 74, pleaded guilty in June to 13 murders and nearly 50 rapes between 1975 and 1986, and has now been told by a Sacramento judge that he will die in prison.

Over three days of hearings, the serial killer was branded a “sick monster”, a “horrible man” and “subhuman” by survivors and the families of victims.

The son of one victim told him: “You are gone and the bogeyman is done.”

Ahead of his sentencing, DeAngelo rose from his wheelchair and took off his mask to tell victims he was “truly sorry”.

DeAngelo had managed to evade capture for decades, until he was finally caught when investigators used DNA from a popular genealogy site to track him down.

He had made incriminating statements after his arrest claiming he was driven by an uncontrollable force inside of him, a Sacramento court heard.

DeAngelo agreed to admit to all allegations against him – including dozens of rapes too old to prosecute – as part of a plea deal which spared him from a potential death sentence.

Nearly three dozen victims and survivors told their stories while DeAngelo sat in court wearing a face mask and orange prison scrubs.

The son of Winnie Schultz, who was raped in her home on 18 October 1976, asked DeAngelo: “You remember me?”

Pete Schultz, who was 11 at the time of the attack and his sister aged five, described how the attacker “woke us up, tied me to the bedpost until my hands turned blue, locked my sister in her room and performed horrific acts against my mother while she was bound and blindfolded”.

He continued: “We have lived with this for 44 years as a family and we are here to say our mother is not Jane Doe number 22 and we are not just number 37 uncharged offence.

“We are the family of Winnie Schultz and we have all survived because of her bravery and resolve to do whatever it took to save herself and her family.”

The attack on Ms Schultz is uncharged as it is too old to prosecute.

Jane Carson-Sandler, who was raped in 1976, told DeAngelo: “You are finally going to prison and will remain there until you die.”

She recalled how he had famously left behind a roast in the oven when he was arrested in 2018, and said the survivors now plan to celebrate each anniversary of his arrest with a similar feast “in memory of your capture”.

“Too bad you won’t get to enjoy it,” she said.

DeAngelo’s ex-wife, Sharon Huddle, also said in a court filing how she was fooled and refused to refer to him by name.

“I trusted the defendant when he told me he had to work, or was going pheasant hunting, or going to visit his parents hundreds of miles away,” she wrote.